Hidden Hawai’i: Korean Americans, Kailua and the quiet life

On the new version of “Hawaii Five-O,” two actors of Korean descent (Daniel Dae Kim and Grace Park) play “local” cousins Chin Ho Kelly and Kono Kalakaua, while in real-life Hawai’i, Korean drama miniserials are popular among TV viewers, and Kapi’olani Park hosted the ninth annual Korean Festival in July. But the visibility of Korean Americans in Hawai’i is relatively new, despite a wave of immigration to the islands that started in 1903.

Sandra Park, author of “If You Live in a Small House.”

Park’s novella includes rare historical photos.

Similarly, the beauties of Kailua on the Windward Side of O’ahu were largely hidden from Mainland visitors for years, blocked by relative inaccessibility until the Pali Tunnel opened to two-way traffic in 1961, and preserved from resort and hotel development that could have lured tourists from Waikiki. But even before then-presidential candidate Barack Obama brought national attention to Kailua by renting an opulent beachfront home there, the growing number of (often unlicensed) vacation rentals and B&Bs in the area was a tip-off that more malihini had discovered the quiet beach town.

So it’s timely that Palo Alto author Sandra Park‘s poetic new novella, “If You Live in a Small House” (Mutual Publishing), reveals multiple hidden worlds: the small-town ways of Kailua (and Hawai’i) in the early 1950s, before statehood and during the Korean War; the perspective of Korean Americans in Hawai’i, several generations after their arrival; and the rich interior life of multigenerational family living together but growing apart. Park will read from her work at 7:30 tonight (Oct. 11) as part of the Odd Mondays Series at Noe Valley Ministry, 1021 Sanchez St., in San Francisco.

I recently spoke with Park, who has lived in the Bay Area since 1971, about her hometown of Kailua, the little-known experiences of Koreans in Hawai’i and the more obvious connection of Hawai’i and California, all of which inspired the novella.

“Ever since moving here, I always feel homesick,” Park said. “The crazy thing is, you feel so homesick that you go back home but it no longer exists, because times have changed in Hawai’i. One way to bring back that slow and sweet pace is to find your home in your writing.”

Although the pace of life is different from her childhood, Park admitted there’s still much about modern Kailua that strikes a chord with her and presumably another Mainlander who grew up in Hawai’i, President Obama. The Obamas are drawn to vacations in Kailua because they’re “looking for that slow sweet pace of life and the place that’s maintained its sense of character,” she theorized.

“One of the things that Kailua has done, which is really hard to do, is that they have stubbornly protected the character of the town,” Park said. “There are no high- rises, there are no hotels — anytime you propose something like that, committees form overnight. And way back when, it wasn’t the environmental groups who were doing that, it was the women’s outdoor circle who loved it and wanted to protect it from development.”

In Kailua, “(Obama) can take his kids to Island Snow, stand in line with everybody else, and everybody leaves him alone,” Park added. “There’s tremendous respect for him and his family. And you don’t see any entourage; when you look out on the water, you see a big rubber boat with someone bobbing, and there’s one person on the beach who’s clearly not relaxing, but otherwise he barely makes a ripple.”

Even though she goes back to Hawai’i “all the time,” Park said, “because there’s so much Hawaiian culture here, you always feel close to it: California feels like an extension of Hawai’i to me. If you want to hear acoustic slack key guitar, chances are it will be easier to find here than there.” (One example: Berkeley slack-key guitar virtuoso Patrick Landeza contributed the music for her promotional video, below.)

I asked Park why the Korean experience in Hawai’i is not as well known as that of other Asian and Pacific Islander groups.

“To call Koreans the hidden minority makes a certain sense,” she said, “because when I was growing up, if you had to check a box for ethnicity, there was one for Chinese, Japanese or Filipino,, but if you were Korean you had to check ‘other.'”

The fact that fewer Koreans immigrated meant that as a group they were “not as cohesive,” Park said. “The smaller number became an advantage, because the Koreans tended to learn English more quickly. My grandparents from Korea spoke English and were proud that they could speak to their grandkids in English.”

But the larger Japanese and Chinese American communities are “big enough that there are institutions that support their narratives,” Park noted. “In many ways, the Korean story is a somewhat hidden history, because it’s somewhat more fragmented.”

As for today’s appeal of Korean soap operas in Hawai’i, she said, that also has something to do with a gentler pace of life that people crave. “I asked my mother and her friends, and the reason that they love them is that the pace is much slower. Oftentimes there is a scene where people are sitting around the people, literally munching their food. There’s no fast-forward. And even though there is a lot of romance and drama, there isn’t any explicit sex and violence … They liked the camera’s eye on domestic life.”

Speaking of television, although there has been some criticism in the Hawai’i press for casting non-local ethnic Korean actors on the new “Hawaii Five-O,” Park doesn’t see it as an issue.

“When I think about how I grew up in the islands, and how I see things now, I think it’s fair to say that one of the things we’ve learned is to become more sophisticated about gender, race and class. If you go to any family birthday party or wedding in the islands, and the question is who is the authentic local, it’s everybody at the wedding, everybody at the party,” she said.

“And when I go to slack-key guitar concerts in the Bay Area, I feel the same thing,” Park added. “I don’t care what stripes and spots you have. Everyone feels the music together, and everyone has their memory of Hawai’i. I would not want to say one person’s memory is more authentic than another.”

Park will return to Kailua for a reading at BookEnds Nov. 6, making several other O’ahu appearances before readings at Moe’s Books in Berkeley Nov. 16 and BooksInc. in Palo Alto Nov. 18; for details, see her Web site.

Reader Nicolas Van-Beek of San Francisco also used to live in Kailua, on Ku’ukama Street in the late ’80s, recognized it right off, as did fellow San Franciscan Bart Dekker, who also identified a portion of the Kāne’ohe Bay Marine Corps Base and Mōkapu Point in the first photo and the second picture’s view “looking back towards the Ko’olau, showing Mount Olympus.”

“As Honolulu and Waikiki became more and more crowded,” he wrote, “I found myself heading over to the Windward side of the island, exploring not only all the great beaches, but all of the local sites, from farms to the old sugar mill at Kahuku, the North Shore surf areas, and not to forget the shave ice in Hale’iwa Town on the way home.”

Retired Navy man Derek Williams of Grass Valley just happened to be on O’ahu and was planning to head over to Kailua for some shave ice when yesterday’s photo quiz ran, perhaps one reason he called it “way too easy,” before sharing this anecdote:

I first discovered Kailua (in) fall 1992, while spending a week at a lovely beach house, in Kaneohe Marine Base. Wandered over to the town of Kailua and fell in love with the beach. Whenever I visit Waikiki, from downtown I take the bus over to Kailua, often walking to the beach, and on the way back stopping off at Island Snow for some of the best shave ice in Hawaii.

Williams is not the only visitor to be captivated by Kailua’s charms. “My wife and I recently spent a couple of days there, and fell in love with the town and the beach. We plan on going back for a month next year!” wrote Jim Barrett of Santa Rosa.

Jeanne Cooper / Special to SFGate

From Kailua Beach Park, the distinctive Mōkapu Point can be seen in the distance.

Jeanne Cooper / Special to SFGate

The backdrop of the Ko’olau mountains as seen from Kailua Beach Park is also memorable.